Two of Rogues: Voetrot Stories, #1

By Francois-Rene du Toit

Two of Rogues is an adult heroic fantasy novel split into ten separate story chapters starring two protagonists: the magic-wielding misanthropic mercenary Verl, and the charismatic thief Ikati. Together they must overcome their mutual amorality (and professional incompetence) to overcome numerous challenges in the semi-noble pursuit of lots of money: greedy knights, magical abominations, criminal master-wizards and one particularly hungry tiger to name but a few.

 

Described in professional assessment as 'a great rollicking story... a world that is confidently built around the adventures of two reprobates', Two of Rogues is a fresh spin on fantasy, inspired by medieval history to the point that even non-fantasy readers can enjoy it.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Francois-Rene Toit
• Release date: Sep 11, 2021
• ISBN: 9798201201456

Book preview

Meeting and Retreating

The city of Marsh Queen , Year 132 of the Marshal’s Law. Even after everything that had happened in the decades before – the Crisis of Rats, the death of the last Karthir Emperor, the Final Flight of the Necromancers - it was still the epicentre of power in the Great Marsh, the seat of power for the Warden of the Marsh today and tomorrow, and a melting pot of citizens and denizens from all over the continent of Voetrot.

It was also pouring with rain. Serious rain, too. This was not the cool, sweet smelling drizzle of the Autumn Fields, or the dank, dark downpour of God’s End. It was nothing like the rain of the Firewall Islands, where ash and smoke perpetually jockeyed for position with the water, or even Glassgate, where the rain pelted down like freezing shards of glass. No, this was a good old sub-tropical Great Marsh thunderstorm, hot, steamy, and heavy, pouring down like someone had upended an ocean-sized bucket of tepid bathwater over the land. It was a rain most terrible for taking a walk in without an oiled rain-cloak, but it was great for the grass, rivers, fish, crops, innkeepers, foot fungus and mosquitoes.

And great to stay out of, thought the rogue to herself, moving down the wet street in haste. She was covered in a thick woollen cloak and hood, but she was still soaked through. She didn’t have much time, but the man she was looking for would not be hard to find. He was a predictable sort: mages preferred routine.

There. ‘The Drunken Catfish’ – an expensive inn, but the right location and style.

She opened the door, nodding to the bouncer as she walked in. He nodded back, and she pressed a copper into his palm as she walked past. She always believed in being nice to the man at the door, in case she had to leave in a hurry.

She scanned the crowd in the smoky interior, ignoring the hubbub. Where would he be... somewhere out of the way... there. A table in the corner, with only one out of two chairs occupied. The sole occupant was shrouded in his own hood and cloak despite being indoors.

She grinned and moved forward through the mob like a snake through dry grass.

VERL WAS GRUMPY, WHICH was more or less his standard state of being. The Drunken Catfish was expensive, and the clientele wasn’t much better company than the sober catfish in the gutters outside. His last job (a boring stint guarding some firewood merchant’s stall) had barely been profitable. He had left his last mercenary band on bad terms weeks ago. The fact that he had been stiffed out of a large amount of his pay was why he had left, having to restrain himself from putting a dagger in the sleeping throat of every last one of them. They wouldn’t have fallen for that anyway... that damn Crossing-Town girl of theirs (what was her name? He had never bothered to remember) was always awake before he was. The others kept snoring right through his departure. Verl wondered again if he was really cut out for the adventurer’s life, feeling that he lacked the basic tolerance of idiocy and laziness that such a profession required, which extended to the necessary tolerance for dealing with the same kind of unsavoury people over and over again; fences, thugs, thieves, bandits, mages, nobility, scholars... his reservoir of distaste for mortal-kind grew with every job he did. Maybe it was time for a change? He could become a bodyguard (although nobles in particular tended to make his teeth itch). He could join the Gold Companies (although they’d rejected him before). He could...

... he could have his glum reverie interrupted by someone gently tapping the half-empty tankard gripped in his twitchy hands. A familiar figure eased down into the seat in front of him, lithe and muscled as a panther as she shrugged off her cloak. She wore a dark green doublet with short sleeves prominently displaying well-toned and tanned arms, and dark woollen leggings covered her legs. Standing upright she’d be able to look Verl in the eye, but something in the way she held herself made her seem smaller, friendlier, and more approachable. This offset any intimidating factor that might be caused by the long, heavy knives she carried in sheathes on her thighs, angled so they were less visible from the front. Her eyes stole the show, though: golden as honey, open and friendly and inviting you to gossip and pay her in gold. A traveller’s cap, the same green as her shirt, sat upon neatly cut auburn hair that was tied back in a short braid. A light traveller’s pack was strapped to her back, but satchels and bags covered her torso, the contents unknowable. She was of Crossing-Town, as indicated by the tattoos covering her arms depicting rivers, wading birds and pleasure barges. They marked her as a Barge’s Guild graduate, although Verl knew what her real trade was. She was grinning like a cat with a bird in its paws, not noticing or not minding the aura of stubborn belligerence that now surrounded Verl like the aftermath of a wet, angry fart.

See Verl now, in contrast: tall, lanky, wiry, yet slumped in his seat like a badly trained hunting dog. Dark stubble covered his weathered face and his shaved head, rough as sandpaper. Draped in his dark cloak you could almost mistake him as wearing robes underneath it, but a second glance would show that the scruffy black cloth that shrouded his body was a surcoat: cloth over mail armour, which rustled gently whenever he moved. A single-edged sword was carried in a scabbard at his left hip, with a dagger strapped on his right. He carried no helmet, no shield, and no pack: odd for anyone, even more so for a sellsword. His dark, surprisingly beautiful green eyes were in marked contrast to the rest of him as he stared at the grinning figure before him, her catlike eyes glowing like torches in the dim light of the inn and his glowering like dark, cynical green marbles.

‘You again.’ he said.

‘Yes, me again. Nice to see you remember me.’

‘I don’t. You just look like you’ve made my life worse somehow, so I assume I’ve met you.’

‘Still so cold, Verl? After all the nice things I’ve done for you?’

‘If by that you mean, ‘returned the things you stole from my pack after your mates stabbed me in the back’, then yes. Call me Sir Iceberg, lord of Piss Off I’m Drinking.’

Her smile faded a notch. She was only now starting to remember how surly the mercenary in front of her could get. ‘You know why I’m here now?’

‘It’s raining outside and this dump is nearest to the gate. And that’s the only spare seat, due to my strenuous efforts to be all by myself.’

‘No, that’s why you are in here, you lazy sod. I’m in here because I was looking for someone, and that someone is you.’

‘Well, you’ve found me.’

‘Right. Verl: I have a job offer for you.’

‘Seriously? Go away. I’m done with teamwork, I’m communing with my drink, and she’s a lot more interesting than you are.’

Her mirth was entirely gone. She leaned forward and hissed directly into his face.

‘If it was anyone else, I’d have given up at this point. I ditched the arseholes that cheated you, I come all this way to apologise and offer you the chance of a lifetime, and this is the thanks I get?’

There was a moment of silence broken only by some of the other patrons at the bar drunkenly singing, someone spilling wine on themselves and overreacting, the huge bouncer at the door throwing an overly drunk man into the rain head first and someone snatching the badly tuned lute from the bard and smashing it on the floor, to the general rejoicing of the room. Maybe it wasn’t exactly a moment of silence in what was a noisy and crowded inn, but it was a momentary lull in the conversation between the two individuals.

Verl broke the not-silence first, in a somewhat more thoughtful tone of voice.

‘You know, if you had mentioned all of that first, I might have been slightly politer. Like, I would have asked you what your name was again.’

‘...it’s Ikati. Will you listen to me now?’

‘I’m not doing anything else with my evening.’

Somewhat mollified, Ikati settled back in her seat. ‘Here’s the deal: I’m sorry for what happened: how you got cheated out of your pay on that expedition. We’re also both in serious trouble.’

‘Is that so? Where are the others, then? Where are the repentant multitudes, all grovelling at my feet and begging for forgiveness? And what kind of trouble, exactly?’

‘They’re dead, you arrogant prick. All of the others in that party, they’re all dead now.’

‘Ah, that kind of trouble. How are they dead?’ asked Verl.

She leaned over and whispered in his ear. ‘The Mourning Guild. There were contracts on all of us. They all were dead within a week of you leaving, and I just barely escaped with my own life. At first, I thought you were responsible, seeing how angry you were about your pay. But if you had the coin to order half a dozen assassinations through the Guild you wouldn’t be in this line of work, would you?’

His morose frown had twisted into a gleeful grin that threatened to split his face in half, to Ikati’s bemusement.

‘That explains the greater than usual number of people trying to murder me these last few weeks. I was wondering who I had annoyed.’

He took a swig of ale, swilling it around his mouth thoughtfully.

‘Our most academic employer wanted to keep us all quiet about something, probably something we found. Most deliciously treasonous. You’re looking for a bodyguard against the Guild, then?’

‘No.’

Her response was not what he had been expecting. ‘So... what, then?’

‘I know why Masseloff wanted us out of the picture. I know what it is that he wanted to keep to himself. And I know how we can steal it from right under his nose.’

‘Do tell. How do you know this?’

‘There was one chest that he wanted us to bring up from the ruin. He didn’t want us to open it, he said that it was cursed or booby-trapped or something. But I-’

‘You opened it.’

‘Well... yes. Kind of.’

‘Thus causing him to panic and all your mates to get killed.’

Ikati gaped at him. ‘He was going to do that anyway!’

‘And how do you know that?’

‘Standard operating procedure for trafficking in items worth killing for. Duh.’

‘Which means we all – which includes you - should’ve taken the hint when signing up for that expedition. Ever heard the phrase ‘curiosity did not kill the cat but caused a surprising amount of collateral damage’? Because I think that phrase is rather apt for this particular incident.’

Now it was her turn to glower at the man across from her, sipping his cheap ale and looking like he was enjoying himself far too much. ‘Are you quite finished?’ She said dryly.

‘Not quite. I have a question or two.’

‘Fine. What?’

‘Firstly: why come to me, of all people?’

‘Because you were there, on that expedition. Because you would know that I’m not lying, or crazy. You’re still alive. You’re a mage. And you have a stake in this. Your own skin, for a start.’

‘Fair enough. Second question: what was it you saw in that chest?’

Ikati’s eyes darted. She already knew that he wouldn’t like the answer, because like the thing she’d seen it was vague and hinted of something dangerous.

‘I... don’t know what it was exactly.’

Verl raised one eyebrow. ‘Really? I thought you said that you knew what Masseloff was after.’

‘I do! I just don’t know what it is, exactly. I just know it is valuable, seeing as he was willing to kill for it and that he wants to keep it a secret.’

‘Describe it to me.’

Instead, Ikati started to rise. ‘Not here, we need to talk somewhere safe...’

Verl spread his hands. ‘Here is as safe as anywhere if the Guild is after us, right?’

Ikati’s shoulders sagged. He had a point there: when the Mourning Guild was after you, nowhere was really safe. She sank back down.

‘Now, a description, if you will.’

‘I only managed to snatch a peek at it. It was like a... shard. Dark, shiny, like black glass.’

Verl froze, his tankard at his lips.

Ikati stared. ‘You know what it is?’

‘Sounds like obsidian. Which is valuable, but also really good enchanting material. Meaning that lump of rock has been tampered with in a way that Masseloff finds very interesting.’

‘Like how? In what way?’

‘Likely something powerful, useful, dangerous or all three. Doesn’t matter what exactly, but all the same: time to leave town, methinks.’

Ikati rose again. ‘Glad you agree. Let’s get on the road.’

HOODED, CLOAKED, AND soaked, the pair left the Drunken Catfish and started walking towards the West Gate of Marsh Queen. On the way, Ikati started explaining her plan, seemingly gaining confidence with every step they took.

‘It’s simple, right? We go to the bastard’s mansion in Manors-Home, break in, steal the thing, and sell it. Charter a ship to Al’Qarash and the Guild will never catch us. We can figure out the details once we’ve scouted out the place.’

Verl shrugged. ‘Fair enough. I take it you’ve broken into secure magical compounds before?’

‘Well... not magical ones.’ He glared at her out of the corner of his eyes, still bloodshot from alcohol and rough sleep.

‘I don’t want to hear that. What I want to hear is, ‘Oh yes, I’ve robbed hundreds and I know exactly what I’m doing’. Please tell me that’s what you actually meant?’

Ikati bristled at that. ‘I do know what I’m doing! It’s just I usually prefer to be hired by the people living in the magically secure compounds, rather than robbing them. It tends to be less illegal, and more profitable.’

‘You have a point. I kind of thought the whole idea around being a thief was procuring things illegally...’

‘‘Steal from the rich, you’ll have big money and big worries. Steal from the rest, and you’ll have small money but small worries.’’

‘Catchy. Sounds like a quote.’

‘My Guild master always said that.’

‘Smart man.’

They had reached the gate. The night watchman on duty hailed them, and stepped forward.

‘Well, well, well, if it isn’t Verl Gift-Land!’

Ikati looked at Verl askance.

‘Old nickname.’ he said, apparently the only explanation going to be given.

‘Finally decided to get off your arse and start work again, eh? Guess I just lost my bet with the captain.’ said the guard with only a hint of a smirk in his voice.

‘I grieve for your empty purse, Bog-foot.’

The guard flinched. ‘Not that nickname, Verl, not in front of the lady!’

‘Oh yeah, right. Lips sealed, I swear.’

The guard looked them up and down. ‘Well, you don’t appear to be covered in other people’s blood for once, so head on through. Though why you’d choose to leave on a night like this is beyond me.’

‘No man ever made it big by letting the weather keep him inside. Good night to you, Boris.’

The pair walked through the gates and onto the bridge leading over the river Rotsteth, then onto the road leading west. For about an hour as they wound their way through damp fields, no words passed either of their lips. When the city was just getting to be out of sight, Verl broke the silence.

‘Well...?’

‘Well what?’

‘Don’t you want to know about old Bog-foot back there?’

‘I’m sure it’s none of my business.’ There was a smile in her voice.

‘I can practically smell your eagerness to know. Besides, isn’t your primary source of income getting into other people’s business?’

‘Well, if you don’t mind sharing the story...’

For a moment, Verl considered whether he should actually tell her. It was a story of pain, suffering and personal humiliation happening to a number of people, including himself. On the other hand, the people involved were generally either malicious or at the very least annoying, so they had it coming (especially himself). On the third hand, the story was somewhat hilarious and it was a long walk to Manors-Home.

He began the way such tales tend to begin...

‘It was a dark and stormy night-’

‘Oh, come on!’ Ikati exclaimed, gesturing to the weather all around them.

‘It had drizzled the night through and it was early in the morning, alright? The minstrels embellish all the time, why can’t I?’ Verl complained.

‘Because when they do it, it’s with a catchy tune?’

‘Hmph. Anyway, it was back in the early days of my career, when I wasn’t as good at making friends as I am now-’

He stopped, because Ikati appeared to be choking on something.

‘If you’ve quite finished...’

‘Sorry... gnkt... do go on.’

‘Hmph. I was just getting started, right, and this merchant in Marsh Queen hires me to... negotiate...  with one of her competitors, who seemed to be getting suspiciously successful after running a failing store for years. I thought, alright, shouldn’t be a problem, so I head over there and-’

‘You found out that merchants with something to hide tend to hire a bodyguard?’

‘Two bodyguards, in this case. Worrytown men by the looks of ‘em, both big and ugly. They weren’t open to negotiation, so... I tried intimidation.’

Ikati looked askance at him. Verl could not be said to be a particularly imposing individual. He was tall, but he had a wiry, gangly build that wasn’t the right kind of intimidating for a hired thug.

Of course, he had to have some tricks up his sleeve...

‘How’d you intimidate them?’

‘I didn’t. What I did do was conjure a fireball just as the merchant threw a necklace at my face.’

‘Oh dear... wait, you can conjure fireballs?!’

Verl gave her a dirty look, with the effect somewhat ruined by the rain-cloak hiding his face and the rain hitting it. ‘Yes, I can conjure fireballs. It’s one of the reasons why that troupe of apes you were with hired me.’

‘I’ve never seen you do it.’

‘I never needed to. I was stuck on rear-guard, and that ruin had only snakes and bugs in it.’

‘Uh huh...’

‘Fine, don’t believe me. Anyway; once I managed to get off my arse I legged it outside like a scalded cat, straight into the guards that’d been attracted by the noise. Not my best moment, not by a long shot.’

Ikati chuckled. Verl was a better story teller than she had expected.

‘So how’s this relate to Bogfoot?’

‘Well... I panicked. I didn’t want to end up in a dungeon, so I kicked one of the guards in the jewels to make an opening so I could run away. Nearly broke it.’

‘You... nearly broke his...?’

‘No, my foot. You’ve noticed how the guards in the big city wear full plate armour? Covering everything, head to toe?’

‘Oh.’

‘Yep. So I half-ran, half-hopped away, with the affronted guard in hot pursuit. He very nearly caught me. Cornered me in an outhouse, in fact. I only managed to escape by grappling his leg and jamming it down under the seat. First time Boris called me those names, though not the last.’

Ikati cracked up laughing. ‘Hence the name!’

‘Hence the name. I got caught anyway, though. Spent a few nights in the watch house calls for causing a public disturbance. Only reason I’m not still down there is because no one got seriously hurt, no public property was damaged and my antics blew the lid on the Black-Lung smuggling operation that merchant was running.’

‘Which merchant?’

‘The one who hired me, actually. The guards grilled me for what in Hel’s name happened, and that led them to knocking on my employer’s door. Turns out her rival had been cutting into her real line of work, and that’s why she hadn’t gone to the guards in the first place. They both lost their heads for it, naturally.’

‘Wow... and that kicked off your adventuring career?’

‘No, not really. It was the third contract in Marsh Queen I’d taken, and apparently the bitch never planned on paying me. More like my first real cock-up on the job.’

They walked in silence for a while. Genuine silence this time, as the rain had finally decided to ease up. They were out of sight of the city now, and turning south-west on the long road to Manor’s Home. Ikati looked thoughtfully at the fields they were passing. It occurred to her that in the brief time she had known Verl, she had never heard so many words come out of his mouth at once. The revelation that he knew magic was intriguing... perhaps he wasn’t just the usual kind of hired sword.

‘Well, I guess it’s only right that I try and top a story like that-’

‘Save it for later, my ears are tired from listening to myself talk.’

... or maybe not.

TALKING ABOUT WALKING to the town of Manors-Home was one thing, but it was not a journey to be undertaken lightly. It was at least a few days by horseback, assuming you did it at a canter and changed horses at least once, and by foot it was almost a week. After a very brief debate over which form of travel was better (Ikati being more of a boat person than a horse person and Verl disliking horses on principle), they set out after purchasing some cheap supplies from a wandering merchant band they ran into (a much longer dispute erupted over whether it was wise to spend actual coin on ‘marketplace-reject crap’ as Ikati so eloquently called it.

Now there was the route to discuss, as they walked westward along the old imperial road. Ikati was in favour of town-hopping, stopping in on villages and towns on the way to get supplies and news. Verl was less than enthusiastic.

‘We really should not leave a gossip trail for the guild to follow. Peasants have loose lips, especially when bribed.’ he said tersely.

Ikati rolled her eyes. ‘Keep your own lips tight about who we are and where we’re going, and we shouldn’t have any problems. In fact, keep your lips sealed: your mouth might get us into trouble.’

Verl bristled slightly at that. ‘When has my mouth ever gotten us into trouble?!’

‘Remember that barroom brawl in Gullstream, a few weeks ago? When we were first setting out on the expedition with the others?’

He considered it for a moment. ‘No.’

‘You don’t... you made a snide remark about the beer, and it turns out the brewer and his cousins were at the table right behind us!’

‘Doesn’t ring a bell.’

‘The whole bar got smashed!’

‘Nope.’

‘Willem got stabbed!’

‘Who?’

Ikati paused. ‘The bartender threw a barrel at you?’

Recollection dawned on Verl’s face. ‘Oh, I remember now! It was that inn off the left of the town square! Only enjoyable moment on that lousy trip.’

‘Enjoyable...?!’

‘I threw the barrel back at him. Think I broke his nose, and served him right. There were rat droppings in that ale.’

Ikati shook her head. ‘I can’t believe that is what jogged your memory. Everyone was incredibly angry with you.’

‘People usually are angry with me. I stopped caring about that long ago.’

‘Seriously – never mind, let’s hear your route plan then.’

‘Go off-road. The Mourning Guild will have a harder time finding us cross-country.’

‘So we risk wild animals, bandits, rough terrain and getting lost instead?’

‘None of those things are actively looking for us and none of them are actually being paid to kill us. The advantage is with us there.’

‘How about we compromise by going cross country when it’s quicker and stopping by a town every so often in case we need something.’

‘I hate compromises. Everyone’s unhappy with a compromise.’

‘Well, I hate the wilderness and you hate people. We’ll just have to live with both.’

With Verl grumbling his consent, the pair set off for fortune and petty vengeance.

THE FIRST FEW DAYS were, to put it bluntly, not pleasant. Allocating tasks between the two of them turned out to be a major problem. Not because either of them was unwilling to do something, be it prepare food, fires, negotiate prices, fix a torn shirt or the like, but that they both knew how to do such things and had very firm views on how the other one was doing it, which was usually wrong.

‘I told you, you have to double-stitch so it doesn’t fall apart again-’ Ikati said for the umpteenth time.

‘And use twice as much thread? Do I look like I’m made of money?’ Verl snapped.

‘Well, if you want to be so thrifty maybe you shouldn’t wear a dress that gets caught on brambles?’

‘It’s a surcoat, you ignorant wench, and better it gets torn than rain rust my armour solid. Now why don’t you belt up and go find some dry firewood or something.’

Swearing under her breath and biting back further retorts, Ikati stalked off. Finding dry wood in the summer near Marsh Queen was a bit like trying to find the vegetarian option in a slaughterhouse, and a fire would be almost impossible to start anyway in the soggy humidity. No, it was obvious that Verl just wanted to be left alone to mangle his clothing in peace, so... she’d jolly well find something else to do until he’d stabbed himself with a needle one too many times and gave up. Not for the first time, she glumly considered giving up on the whole business and running away north to Sorci. The weather would be better at least, or at least drier...

It was at that point, kicking damp twigs out of the way and trying to think soothing thoughts about gold Sovereign coins, that she saw a light shining through the evening drizzle.

CAREFULLY TYING THE knot of the linen thread, Verl then gently tugged to make sure his surcoat wouldn’t fall to pieces again. Satisfied, he muttered some incomprehensible syllables under his breath that caused the soggy garment to start steaming dry even as he pulled it over his head. No sooner had he pulled his head through the neck-hole than Ikati bounded up like an excited terrier.

‘Good news!’

‘You’ve stashed a bunch of dry firewood somewhere that is getting wet even as we speak?’

‘I found us lodging for the night!’

Verl groaned, and pinched his nose. ‘Do we have to? The Guild is likely right behind us...’

Ikati put her hands on her hips, in the gesture known as You Are Not Going to Win This Argument.

‘Verl, it’s getting dark and there’s no way we’re getting a fire started with the woods this soaked. Unless you want to magic up a fire for us...?’

Her companion’s shoulders sagged. ‘No... lead on, then.’

As they packed, Ikati couldn’t help wondering why Verl was so reluctant to use the magic he kept claiming he could do. People trained in both arms and magery tended to be very rare: the two skill sets tended not to mix well for some reason. She’d only ever seen him use it to keep his gear in order: his clothing dry, his mail (mostly) clear of rust and his blades clean. He’d never offered to light a fire with magic, nor do anything else to make their lives actually easier.

Perhaps she should have asked, but she was too happy to actually get indoors for the first time in three days.

The Laughdrop inn was noisy and crowded, situated as it was between Marsh Queen and Manor’s Home, and Ikati had to play a complicated game of charades in order to get two mugs of beer, bowls of porridge and sleeping spots by the fire (in that order).  Through using a combination of polite elbows and knees, they managed to get a bench to themselves. For a while they just ate and drank, making a little island of silence in the middle of the hubbub.

Verl broke the silence first. ‘Ikati?’.

Ikati raised an eyebrow. ‘Oh?’

‘I don’t think we should spend the night here. Anyone here could give us away.’

Ikati gave him a glare that made him lean back in his seat.

‘That’s the kind of thing you should say before I fork over a silver coin to get the good spots by the fire. Answer would still be no, anyway.’

Verl seemed about to say something, but he flinched instead, cocking his head to one side as if listening to something. 

‘What is it?’

‘It’s too late, is what it is. They’re here.’

FOR THE UNINITIATED reader, it is necessary to describe what kind of a pickle our pair of (potential) protagonists are in. The Mourning Guild was one of Voetrot’s most feared band of killers, a cult-like collection of assassins, espionage agents, undertakers and straight-out professional murderers in service to a Demigod known only as ‘The Judge’. It was said that the Guild worshipped the Trio of Existence; Askr, Frayr and Hel, the three goddesses making up the cycle of birth, life and death respectively. It was claimed that they would respond to contracts offered via a mysterious ritual and bargain known as ‘Checking Balance’. It was also said that their assassins entered into a bargain with Hel, the Goddess of Death, that made them impossible to kill, invisible in the shadow of a needle and that they could – and would – assassinate the gods themselves if the price was high enough. Like all good conspiracy theories, the rumours and conjecture swirling around them were often indistinguishable from the reality. Rumours aside, one thing was generally agreed about them: any poor soul who had a contract on their head was as good as dead. The Mourning Guild never gave up pursuit of a contract, and the only way to evade them was to find and kill the one who had commissioned your death.

That last one was apparently so much hot marsh gas, according to Verl. No business ever had a one hundred percent success rate, as far as he was concerned.

A completely innocuous looking cloaked and hooded woman walked through the door of the inn, followed by an even more innocuous-looking cloaked and hooded man. The man had the sort of rounded face that was easy to trust, and that was incredibly hard to remember or identify. He could pass for a merchant, a farmer, even a nobleman if he put on a haughty expression. The woman was equally plain, although more clearly of Karthir extraction with her dark brown skin. She could have been a lady, a maid, a servant... could be any, all or neither. The most noticeable thing about the duo is that they looked completely harmless and approachable.

‘That’s them?’ Ikati whispered.

‘Yep.’ Verl affirmed.

‘Really?’

‘Definitely.’

‘Huh. I’d have marked them for con-men, myself.’

‘You’re not far off. These ones will con you out of your life. Now shush, I have to concentrate.’

With that Verl closed his eyes. Ikati looked down dubiously at the crowd below. She was lying on her ceiling rafter a lot more comfortably than Verl was, although that wasn’t saying much. The smoke from the fireplace and the numerous quasi-legal substances below were making her eyes water, and the damp heat was even worse up here. The Laughdrop had been a hasty bit of construction following a trade boom two years before, and Ikati was feeling every bit of the cost-cutting first-hand as splinters dug into her hands. It was a damn miracle that no one had seen them shimmy up into the rafters. Ikati could spot a handhold with her eyes closed, and apparently Verl had a natural eye for escape routes. Now he was lying on his stomach, face pressed against the wood, muttering to himself. Ikati couldn’t even guess what he was up to. In the brief time they’d adventured together, she hadn’t seen much of what he was capable of. He’d mostly been in the rear-guard, making sure nothing snuck up on the party out of the darkness of the ruin they’d been tasked to explore.

The cloaked figures had integrated themselves at separate tables, and laughter and conversation had resumed at both. More and more of the patrons were starting to give descriptions of a Crossing-Town woman and a mercenary swordsman, some of them gesturing at the bench where Ikati and Verl had been sitting. Whatever Verl was conjuring up, it would have to happen soon.

‘They found us yet?’

Ikati glanced at her ceiling companion. ‘No.’

‘Bugger. This will work better if they see us. Catch their attention, would you?’

‘What? I thought we were hiding!’

‘We’d be up here all night. Get their eyes on us, let me do the rest.’

Ikati bit her lip, but reluctantly pulled a sling-stone from one of her satchels. She frowned as she surveyed her selection.

She took aim at the innocent looking man below (laughing jovially at a joke cracked by a drunken regular), made a prayer to whatever gods were watching, and then lobbed the stone at him.

The man’s hand flew to his head where the stone had bounced off, and his eyes flew up into the rafters, searching. His partner had noticed, and was joining him in scanning the ceiling. Both their gazes met Ikati’s at the same time.

She stared. The assassins stared. Verl leaned over, and crimson light spilled from his eyes.

Blinking the afterimage away, Ikati stared at the scene below in amazement. The male assassin had apparently gone completely mad, and in the space of a second had already killed someone: an unfortunate bar-maid had a dagger slashed across her throat. The next few seconds saw the bouncer and three other surprised souls dodging throwing knives. Two road guards who had moments earlier been sharing a pitcher of beer were now lying on the floor, staring bewildered at the hand-arrows in their chests. The fifth second saw the assassin regain his senses, to his confusion and dawning horror. The two killers were caught right in the middle of a spontaneous mob, half of them making for the nearest exit and the other half closing in with grief, drunken rage or bloody vengeance gleaming in their eyes.

Meanwhile, the two rafter dwellers had made a hasty exit upstairs and through the window of one of the more expensive rooms for rent, surprising a young couple as they... ‘entertained’ each other. After an apology delivered on the run, a frantic sprint down a water-logged path and a few near high-speed collisions with trees they ducked around a handy oak tree, where they stopped to recover both their wits and their breaths.

‘By the Gods... those poor people...’ panted Ikati,

‘Better... them... than us’, wheezed Verl.

‘How much time did that trick buy us?’ asked Ikati, her breathing already steadying. The image of the carnage in the inn flashed before her eyes again, and she felt her gorge rise.

‘Perhaps... a few minutes... or a day... no more than that.’ gasped Verl.

Ikati looked incredulously at her companion, almost grateful for the distraction. ‘Are you seriously that puffed after just that little stroll? I thought you had to be physically fit to be a mercenary.’

‘You try... casting a... complicated... spell... you ain’t good at...’

‘No thanks. It appears to have turned you into a fat old man.’

As Verl grumbled unflattering things under his breath, the pair started walking onwards, leaving the rising commotion of the inn far behind.

Despite her sarcastic bravado, Ikati walked slowly as her thoughts raced around what had just happened. Violence – especially the eldritch kind - wasn’t her usual or preferred line of work, and she was frankly astonished at how the guild had managed to track them. And those poor people in the inn...

‘Verl...’

‘Hmm?’

‘How did you know that those two were the ones after us?’

‘It’s a bit of a trade secret, but you know how the first time you kill someone is the hardest?’

Ikati stared at him with her mouth hanging open. ‘No?’

Verl looked at her in, obviously puzzled. ‘You’ve never killed anyone?’

Ikati’s eyes bulged. ‘What- no, Verl, that’s not what I do!’

‘But you carry big knives, darts and a sling! And you’re a professional criminal!’

‘Everybody carries a knife or two, and when I sling at people I usually go for their knees!’

Verl was silent for a moment. ‘Well, I need a different analogy then.’

‘Take your time.’ Ikati was still unsettled by how casual he was about his question.

‘Well... when you’ve killed someone, it does something to your head. You get... harder. Colder. It’s hard to describe to someone who’s never done it.’

‘Uh huh...’

‘So if you know what to look out for, a seasoned killer stands out really, really easily.’

‘You read their minds.’

‘More like monitored them. What was buzzing in their heads, what they were preparing to do, that sort of thing.’

‘And you made that man kill people...’

Ikati suddenly became aware of a gap beside her. Verl had stopped walking, with a look far too tired and weary for anyone not a hundred years old.

‘I didn’t mean for that to happen. I tried to trigger the fear response, so he and his partner would run away and be petrified at the very thought of chasing us.’

Ikati paused, morning mist dripping off both of them. ‘So why did...?’

‘She realised what I was doing, and broke eye-contact. I’m guessing his training took over: a cornered man will lash out, and if he knows how to lash out properly...’

He walked past her, and Ikati heard him say something under his breath:

‘That’s why you save magic only for when you need it...’

She paused for a moment, letting him walk ahead a bit. She sighed.

‘Best we need as little as possible, then.’ She walked after him, a thief following a killer.

HAVING BEEN FORCED to abandon most of their kit in the Laughdrop, the pair now had to resort to roughing it. Fortunately, Ikati still had her sling, and so roasted squirrel sustained their bellies even as it left a horrible taste in their mouths. Rainwater was plentiful to drink, and even Verl had to admit that life could be much worse.

‘Now if only we’d done this from the beginning...’

‘If only you’d stop feeling smug about being perpetually soaked and eating rodents.’ Ikati had snapped back.

Keeping off the road and following Verl’s impeccable sense of direction, they made good time.

‘Look, it’s not me, the stars must be wrong about which way North is- ‘

‘Error is in the eye of the beholder, darling.’

In fits and starts, they finally made it to their destination, as the rains finally eased up and the summer sun turned the air into first a steamy haze, then a baking oven infested with giant mosquitoes. 

‘OW! Little bugger took a chunk out my nose, I swear...’

‘Poor thing probably broke its teeth.’

NOW THEY WERE OUTSIDE Manors-Home itself, the rebuilt jewel of the Western Great Marsh, the city razed to the